Sunday, February 19, 2012

A typically restrained Telegraph editorial of the "no appeasement to the separatist animals" variety prompted me to leave the following comment -

"The Prime Minister must not give more powers to the Scottish Assembly."

Dear God. There is no body in existence called "the Scottish Assembly". I don't know how anyone can take an editorial seriously after that headline.

"We applaud the commitment that the Prime Minister brings to promoting the cause of the Union. There is nothing in it for him either personally or politically"

Apart from the North Sea oil revenues, the loss of international clout from being PM of a shrunken country, and the headache of where to put Trident once it's removed from Scotland? Yes, apart from those things there's nothing in it for him politically.

"But David Cameron is passionate about maintaining the union between Scotland and England, for no other reason than that he thinks it is in the best interests of both countries to continue with the arrangement that has enriched both for more than 300 years. "

For no other reason than that, the North Sea oil revenues, the loss of international clout from being PM of a shrunken country, and the headache of where to put Trident once it's removed from Scotland. Yup, just the four reasons.

"Mr Salmond’s poll ratings have dipped slightly"

But the SNP's haven't. As for Salmond's personal rating, he's still got a frightening distance to travel before he falls as far as Cameron's UK-wide rating, let alone the PM's rating in Scotland.

* * *

What a difference a week makes at Political Betting. Last Sunday, it appeared that all comments relating to Scotland had been arbitrarily banned from the site, except for the rare occasions when a thread specifically related to Scotland. By Tuesday, the ban had been lifted, and then later in the week the site owner Mike Smithson made the cryptic comment that "contrary to the impression given, no Scottish posters are banned". That contradicted what we had all assumed to be an indefinite ban on the SNP's "King Over The Water" Stuart Dickson, so I wrote to Stuart to check if he was aware that he was no longer banned. It was the first he'd heard of it, so he emailed Mike Smithson to seek clarification. I've no idea what the response was, but the net result is that Stuart is now back in harness for the first time since 2010, to the evident delight of the usual suspects -

"I see Stuart Dickinson coming back has cured the nitteration of all threads issue. much."

Just a fore taste. Imagine the day after a victory for the NO vote in the referendum, it won't just be the Telegraph. This is the reality behind Cameron's promises, even if he wanted to give more powers - which he doesn't - there is no way that the establishment would let him. Can't believe how much the commentariat, like MacWirther and Joyce MacMillan seem to have been taken in by Cameron.